Scam alert: Husband was asked by his "CEO" to buy iTunes gift cards for his clients

LKathrifty on 28/04/2020 - 16:52
Last edited 28/04/2020 - 16:54

Hi Ozbargain brain trust,

I have couple of questions regarding iTunes gift cards:

1) Can you get a refund from Coles and JB hifi if the cards are unscratched and still attached to the backing card?

2) If not, what's the best way to use 10x $100 gift cards? 😂 We have Android phones (my husband has a Macbook though). We could give them as gifts - but do people even want them? We could try to sell them below cost price - but do people buy them? I'm not sure if we personally have ever bought anything from the iTunes store!

Back story:
My husband gets an email at 6am to his work email address from his CEO saying that he shouldn't have too much on the table and can he send him his mobile number. Semi lucidly, T hubby responds, and gets requested by text a few hours later to go buy some iTunes gift cards for the CEO's clients that he is currently in a conference call with. Says that he needs them ASAP and can he get them from the nearest shop. My hubby is the type to panic a little when asked to do a task urgently (especially by the big boss, who hubby knows has gotten more newer members of staff to do tasks for him) and we rush off to Coles to buy the gift cards. Coles says we can only buy 5, so to save time I go and buy the remaining 5 cards from JB hifi.

Hubby sent photos of the barcodes by text and email to his "CEO" and then when told to "peel off the back" he cottoned on to this being a ridiculous task and that he was getting scammed. Hubby called the number (no answer of course) and when we went back to the email I clicked on his CEO's name and an email address came up that was definitely not his CEO's! Luckily we hadn't scratched off the grey stickers and didn't respond further to the scammer.

We called Apple support who advised us to return to point of sale (which we are about to do) since the card are unused - can we get refunds, or will we be disappointed and have $1000 worth of gift cards to figure out what to do with?

(Don't worry, I think I was a pretty supportive wife and hubby has now learnt an important life lesson).

Thanks in advance for any advice!

Entertainment

Comments

    • wittyusername on 29/04/2020 - 09:57
      +4

      I think there are apps you can buy on the app store that say cost $99, 30% goes to the store and 70% goes to the app creator. So on a scam like this they make $700 for a morning of work.

    • gromit on 29/04/2020 - 14:05
      +2

      Itune cards are a perfect item for scammers, they are digital, resellable, transferable overseas without authorities getting involved and without tracing and can be easily laundered through apps or resold. Even drug dealers would get a far worse return on laundered money through casinos.

    • macrocephalic on 29/04/2020 - 15:13
      +2

      It's easy to launder money through iTunes. The scammers create an "app" with in app purchases. They spend the iTunes cards in the app by buying the in app purchases. This way they can send the money to anywhere in he world, very quickly, without having to deal with banks.

      • FW190 on 29/04/2020 - 20:17

        thx everyone, that makes more sense, as there are only so many songs and movies that a scammer can buy on itunes………

        and I guess Apple are more then happy to turn a blind eye to it?

        • ssquid on 29/04/2020 - 20:26
          +2

          Of course. They get at least a 30% cut of the money.

  • Ughhh on 28/04/2020 - 18:37
    +3

    The warning shouldnt be exclusive to CEO, it could be your mother, sister, Co worker, son, anyone.

    These pro Scammers aren't interest in scamming dollars and cents out of you, they want bigger money. So if anyone ask you for large amounts of gift cards, double check everything twice.

    • Any thing on 29/04/2020 - 09:14

      OP read this whirlpool thread that docpol has linked, it’s a similar situation to your husband just a smaller amount of money but they were able to get reimbursed by their bank and they outline the steps they took to do so.

      • Kathrifty on 29/04/2020 - 12:02

        Thanks, yes I read that. I'll be looking into it - not sure it'll work for my credit card though since I wasn't the one being directly scammed but I was just being the supportive wife…

    • Kathrifty on 28/04/2020 - 20:56
      +4

      Thanks for the life advice even though it wasn't part of my OP. I'll get him to discuss that with his therapist, but I'm pretty sure it's just his anxiety.

    • johnno07 on 30/04/2020 - 09:15

      ihbh, you sound not only rude, but also socially inept. It's hard to get anywhere in life having both qualities.

      • ihbh on 30/04/2020 - 09:18
        +1

        Sorry, I did come across rude. See my comment below re personal experience.

        • johnno07 on 30/04/2020 - 10:19

          Your comment below has been pushed to the next page so I didn't see it. If I had I wouldn't have taken the stab I did. So my apologies also!

  • Nutrino on 28/04/2020 - 20:56
    -4

    I would go to a divorce lawyer and ask if they except iTunes cards as payment. Win win.

  • brad1-8tsi on 29/04/2020 - 00:33
    +2

    If the boss is a CEO then why hasn't he a personal assistant? A CEO implies quite a large business.

    Is your husband a direct report to the CEO? I'm an L4 on the hierarchy and there's no way the CEO or an L2 would ask me to lay my own money on the line. Even my direct manager wouldn't ask me, he'd only give approval for me to spend my own money to get reimbursed later (have had to do it when travel plans went wrong while working.

    • ihbh on 29/04/2020 - 08:03
      -4

      Exactly, hence my point about the OP's hubby being a sycophant.

      • Kathrifty on 29/04/2020 - 11:51
        +4

        Way to downplay mental health. I'd say it's a bit cheap, even when we're all about the bargains here.

        • ihbh on 29/04/2020 - 13:13
          +1

          My sincerest apologies. I didn't realise the possibility of mental health.

          The reason I responded like this was based on personal experience. I had a colleague who went out of his way to suck up to a bigger boss and did menial things in front of everyone for the boss such as grabbing the bill for a group lunch/dinner using the bosses' credit card.

          He didn't get a promotion or any special favours but could well have fallen for this scam in an effort to please the boss.

          • Kathrifty on 29/04/2020 - 13:41
            +3

            @ihbh: Thank you for this. Perhaps you didn't see my early reply about his anxiety either.

            Ironically, my husband also detests sycophants and he specifically told me about the "charmers" at his old workplace undermining his work sometimes.

            He's just working through his chronic anxiety, which is most notable in the workplace. Anxious, a bit naive, hyper-efficient…it's a bad combo when your big boss tells you to do something urgently for him and you can't get through to him on the phone. He wouldn't have done it to please his boss, but purely because he was tasked to do it. He's not looking to blame anyone for this and he knows it was his own naivety, but the scammers caught a good one in him for this task!

    • Kathrifty on 29/04/2020 - 11:48

      He does have a PA…🤷‍♀️
      I can't comment on the rest because I don't know, and I don't care to bring it up again with my husband as it's irrelevant and he feels bad enough as it is.

      (he does have a company card that luckily he didn't use - I say why in a different comment)

    • johnno07 on 30/04/2020 - 09:16

      CEO does not imply that large a business these days. Plenty of 5-person startups with CEO, CFO etc etc.

      • brad1-8tsi on 30/04/2020 - 12:28

        I guess everyone loves a title these days. It used to be "Managing Director" was fancy enough enough for most small company owners.

        At my first "real" job everyone was an Assistant Manager because once you became a manager you didn't get paid overtime.

      • biltong2go on 30/04/2020 - 19:53
        +2

        I wanted to weigh in here as a minor entrepreneur of sorts.

        Firstly, you are correct about how the term 'CEO' is used, but in the past few years the intended usage has been corrupted.
        It gets completely over-used.
        These days, every 2nd coffee shop owner claims they're a 'CEO'.

        A CEO is a Chief Executive Officer,
        which by definition, implies that there are other Executive Officers,
        and loosely, an Executive is "a person with senior managerial responsibility in a business."
        So basically, a CEO oversees other Executives / Heads of Department / Managers, such as CFO, COO, CMO, CTO, etc, who, in-turn, oversee other people.

        You can have multiple employees under you, and still not be a CEO.

        If you own a shop/store, you're a founder. You can also be a director depending on the corporate structure.
        But to be a CEO, you need other executive officers.

  • MeesusEff on 29/04/2020 - 01:44
    +5

    My previous workplace (billion dollar mining company) had this go through. CEO sends the head of procurement an email asking him (something) that amounted to thousands of dollars. Email was legitly displayed as the company's email, but as the guy thought it was a bit of an odd request he sent him a direct message and they got IT onto it. So the scams can get pretty sophisticated!

    • The mikky on 29/04/2020 - 07:08
      +2

      Yes it’s pretty easy to spoof an email address.

      • cashews on 01/05/2020 - 15:33
        +1

        It's 2020 and people still don't understand how to spot a scam.

        • The mikky on 01/05/2020 - 19:16
          +1

          Haha you would be surprised how many people still use the most obvious password as well, I remember one time doing a presentation about passwords and used obvious ones like password123 or other ones in the top 20, and afterwards people came up and asked me how I knew their password.

  • trustnoone on 29/04/2020 - 02:16

    Not sure at all, but I heard if you return to point of sale they sometimes check to see if its been used and then they'll do a return, so honestly easiest way is just to check and hopefully you get lucky.

  • pinnacle on 29/04/2020 - 07:14
    +1

    If the Point Of Sale is not taking the Unused cards back, your best bet is to sell them on eBay or Gumtree at a discount. There are people who sell them at 10-20% discount. Not sure whether the rules have changed on these sites recently. There are scammers abound in eBay too and you have the risk of someone doing chargeback after you have sent them the cards. There used to be a legit site that used to purchase back unused gift cards at a heavy discount, you may Google for the site name. Good luck.

  • mapax on 29/04/2020 - 07:54
    +4

    I get that I don’t earn as much as most people on here (especially at the moment) but who spends $1k of their own money for the company?

    On the plus side if OP complains enough to Coles maybe the in-store radio warning will be updated to include this scam and make for a funny story in a few years time?

    • Never Pay RRP on 29/04/2020 - 09:07

      It's quite common to purchase company items and then be reimbursed for your expenses afterwards

      • mapax on 29/04/2020 - 11:03
        +1

        Travel expenses maybe, but for $1k worth of product? I would laugh at my boss if they made such a request and tell them that’s why we have purchase orders and company credit cards.

        • Never Pay RRP on 30/04/2020 - 10:04

          I've purchased over $1000 worth of product for my company and then been reimbursed for it (with written approval from my boss). Yes it is much more common to use purchase orders/finance department to arrange. I'm just saying that the OP's scenario is not completely unheard of

    • Ughhh on 29/04/2020 - 09:47
      -1

      On the plus side if OP complains enough to Coles maybe the in-store radio warning will be updated to include this scam Karen and make for a funny story in a few years time?

      Ftfy

  • Oreostar on 29/04/2020 - 08:28
    +3

    Nothing new to offer except sympathy. And it’s pretty easy for this to happen even with all the warnings up. Friend works at a university and their admin got an email from the head of department asking them to buy iTunes cards for a student giveaway/competition. Bought the cards and then luckily bumped into the head and gave them to them directly and got a wtf look. Was too late by then but can look really legit and sound reasonable. Email was spoofed also.

    Wish you good luck with customer service,

  • Mythreesons on 29/04/2020 - 08:46
    +3

    They do make great gifts, we use iTunes cards to pay for our Netflix.

    • Kathrifty on 29/04/2020 - 11:09
      +2

      Thanks, this would one way to go, but we don't have Netflix and you can't use iTunes gift cards to pay if you're a new user. Perhaps we will find people that do use this method to buy the cards though (…any interest from you? 😊)

      • susmind on 29/04/2020 - 19:01

        Bingo !
        Kudos for the effort in your scam.
        The silliest OZbargainer is the one(s) that get scammed by this scam ;-)

    • brad1-8tsi on 30/04/2020 - 12:30

      i don't think Netflix allows the use of iTunes gift cards for new users

  • DarkOz on 29/04/2020 - 08:59

    If I were you I would check all his other emails and credit card transactions. The scammers could have pretended to be his hot female colleagues previously and who knows what other donations he must have made prior to this?

  • Jackkkkkk on 29/04/2020 - 09:07

    facepalm

    You can't get a refund. Use it on subscriptions paying itunes cards. e.g. 1000/16 = 62.5 months worth of Netflix. Lol

    • Yorkshire-Man on 29/04/2020 - 19:21

      Can't sign up for itunes Netflix anymore, they stopped it

  • darkmoss on 29/04/2020 - 09:21
    -2

    Hubby needs some fish oil for that brain of his

  • bajillionaire on 29/04/2020 - 09:40
    +1

    Would you consider donating them to a charity providing for vulnerable people? Like the Asylum Seekers Centre in Newtown that provides foodbank services to people seeking asylum and refugees. I know that they are always super grateful for these kinds of donations that put essentials directly on the table of people who literally have nothing usually, and are right on the edge of things now.

    • Jackkkkkk on 29/04/2020 - 16:00
      +2

      what are they going to do with itunes cards? buy digital food for the table?

      • bajillionaire on 29/04/2020 - 17:14

        Oh sorry, I read the bit about "Coles and JB Hifi" and thought there were Coles cards in the mix.

  • jacross on 29/04/2020 - 09:59
    +2

    The bit that interests me is that your husband was even willing to do this ridiculous task. Your husband needs to change his perspective on what is an acceptable work task and/or find a new job.

  • redsnowz on 29/04/2020 - 10:04
    +1

    Yes, this scam has been going around. We got 3 cases reported within our company of 16,000 staff.

  • ra3m3 on 29/04/2020 - 10:06
    +1

    I would be worried about my job if my CEO asks for 10x$100 JB Hifi gift cards.

    • netsurfer on 29/04/2020 - 10:17

      I would ask for a corporate credit card first.

      • Kathrifty on 29/04/2020 - 10:42

        He has one - and in throwing him under the bus more, he couldn't remember the pin number because he doesn't usually have to physically use it for purchases over $100. So he used his personal card instead - in the end a lucky break. (though some might say it was unlucky)

        Wouldn't care so much if it was JB hi Fi cards as it's easier to buy physical things for the house and gifts, but they are iTunes gift cards.

        • gromit on 29/04/2020 - 14:48
          +1

          In many ways it is actually an unlucky break. Had it been on the company card this could be a company problem of an employee falling for fraud and you may end up paying nothing depending on employer/insurance etc etc, especially if the email was received in work email.

        • brad1-8tsi on 30/04/2020 - 12:34
          +1

          I'm sure he's a great husband in many other ways

  • coolsteps on 29/04/2020 - 10:30
    +1

    i dont think you can return gift cards to a store as it states it on the receipt. sell them discounted in oz bargain classifieds and try to claim it on tax as a business expense . just tell ato it was ie gifts to employees or promo run to clients.

  • knoxy1001 on 29/04/2020 - 10:31
    +1

    Happened to me early last year, second day on the job and got an email from the ceo asking me to get 5x$100 JB Hifi gift cards and send them to her. Wrote back no worries, but after 5 minutes reconsidered the bizarre request and called my new supervisor, he had no idea, called her to check and they’d spoof’d the email.

    Crazy times.

  • Woof on 29/04/2020 - 10:36
    +2

    I signed up for Kayo this week - they bill you through iTunes. Buying discounted gift cards is a good way to save an extra 20% off your footy subscription (should the season actually restart)…

  • TheBird on 29/04/2020 - 10:41
    +1

    What's your husbands email address? My boss has a bridge he wants you to buy for his client.

    If the scams didn't work, the scammers wouldn't be wasting their time trying them.

    PS. Lesson learned I suppose.

  • parismeow on 29/04/2020 - 10:44
    +3

    A few things to note, your husband should contact his work IT department and report this. If it is happening to him, it could happen to others and they need to be aware of it. Secondly, the scammers now have your hubby's name, email, and phone number - and because you responded they know that you exist. Be careful as they may sell the data on to other scammers to continue to scam.

    Unfortunately I have had the same email come around, and at first glance nearly had the same response that your husband did. Luckily i noticed it was fishy, so said something. Unfortunately this kind of scam is very common.

  • Tomato on 29/04/2020 - 11:02

    I had also received an email from 'ceo' when working for a big company, can't remember what the request was but the first thing that came across my mind was, he has got a PA and she's not on leave, why would the CEO come to me? So i forwarded the email to the PA to clarify and also IT.
    OP should be able to make use of the Coles gift cards? surely you would need to shop at Coles sometimes if not all the time? i believe expiry is 3 years?

    • Kathrifty on 29/04/2020 - 12:06

      They are iTunes gift cards bought at Coles - I wish they were Coles cards! I'd pretty much prefer any other gift card apart from these! Hence why I asked here how best to use them 😂

  • RolandWaites on 29/04/2020 - 11:03
    +6

    Worked in retail for several years. You won't be getting a refund. Apple always does the same thing - passes the buyer back to the seller, who invariably says no we can't refund gift cards.

    In my experience it's not because the seller doesn't want to refund them, it's because the electronic system simply doesn't allow it. Any cards that are "refunded" (and it has happened after the store has screwed up, for example) are written off at the company's expense. They might do that if a trainee cashier has accidentally processed the wrong transaction, but you've got virtually no chance at getting $1000 worth of cards refunded.

    I always thought Apple really ought to have the power to refund them, and then chase up the seller for the money, but they have zero interest in doing that.

  • profeeder55 on 29/04/2020 - 11:07
    +1

    Best way is to sell them off the classifieds section for 10% - 20% discount. Not sure about Gumtree as there's a bunch of scammers lurking there.

  • loke on 29/04/2020 - 11:12
    +2

    Hey OP,

    Happened to a colleague here within like the last 2 months with Google Play gift cards (instead of Apple gift cards).

    Perfect storm of events again, colleague was just recently briefed on an expansion of role to include some administration duties.

    The language/communication in the email was professional and the from email field was overlooked probably something to do with the collapsed view and/or expanded view of the email header and the urgency communicated in the email.

    Anyhow it was fishy and we mentioned it, we have no use for Apple or Google gift cards. We contacted said colleague again and mentioned it was a common scam after the checkout process however.

    Refund was straight forward enough but Coles in-store refused to do it at the point of sale, customer support was contacted, ~couple of business days and colleague got a refund.

  • netsurfer on 29/04/2020 - 11:37
    +1

    Hope you can get a refund. If not, then you could consider selling them at a discount. It's not a good idea to sell on feeBay because feeBay never offers any final fee waiver on gift cards. There is a good reason for that. These gift cards are high risk items. If you get a nasty buyer or a scammer, you could end up losing the gift card(s). It is best to do cash or delivery type of sale.

    iTunes cards are generally useful to iPhone, iPad users. iPhone/iPad users would be happy to receive iTunes cards as presents. Macbook users could use them to buy apps, but do you really need Final Cut Pro ($499.99)?

    • spersephone on 29/04/2020 - 12:34
      +1

      There's an exciting education bundle that includes Final Cut Pro on sale to people with the education discount - $299.99.

  • spersephone on 29/04/2020 - 12:26

    There's a lot of posts here, so I'm sorry if I missed it, but has your husband mentioned this to his CEO? It could be the CEO that got scammed, and his address book sending out requests to everyone in it.

    • spersephone on 29/04/2020 - 12:27
      +2

      And I regularly buy $100 itunes gift cards because I buy movies, tv shows and music, as well as get sucked into buying more coins from stupid games on a far too regular basis.

    • Kathrifty on 29/04/2020 - 12:41
      +2

      Yes there are a lot of posts - probably led by me replying - so I don't blame you. Initially there was a high percentage of irrelevant ones but thankfully it's evened out a bit.

      He has reported it to his CEO and the IT department.

      Hopefully now a few more Ozbargainers are aware of it too! I put the whole back story on for awareness, not to be schooled on spam identification/my husband, though sadly I expected no less 😂

      The actual questions were to ask about refund success, and then what to use iTunes gift cards for - so speaking of…would you be interested to get any off us? At least you know I won't spam you!

    • PurchaseAnxiety on 29/04/2020 - 13:00

      I always figure that these scammers just scrape LinkedIn. They can quite easily find a companies CEO, and at least a few employees of the company. A short educated guess later, they can send out emails to the employees likely email addresses as the 'CEO'.

  • trapper on 29/04/2020 - 13:13

    Just return them and explain you almost got scammed, if they are unscratched should be no problem.

    Also in the future never use a personal account to purchase random things for work, if they want you to buy stuff they should give you a company card to use.

  • kanmen on 29/04/2020 - 13:34
    +10

    This comment isn't helpful in anyway to the predicament you're in, but I just want to say you sound like such a lovely, supportive couple, both of each other but also the people around you. As you can see from the comments above, people can be so judgemental and rude and that's more of a reflection of their own arrogance and narrow-mindedness than the fact that you were so loyal to your husband that you went off with him to buy these gift cards and that your husband was so loyal to his company that he did it without asking questions.

    They see stupidity, I see loyalty and dedication. I'm so sorry that happened to you.

    • raptormesh on 29/04/2020 - 13:59

      People on the net can be such cynical dobs but it isn't without reason.

  • Filbert on 29/04/2020 - 14:07
    +1

    Keep this thread bookmarked so that when he asks 'Why cant I look after the finances a bit?'

    • Kathrifty on 29/04/2020 - 14:12
      +2

      Hahaha - there won't even be a contention. I will begrudgingly look after the finances, and he will happily let me.

  • coolc on 29/04/2020 - 14:16
    +1

    Heard about site Voucha to sell gift cards. Dont know how legit they are. Do your homework and try.

    Im surprised coles did not warned you when purchase cards. I work for majar retailer and we received comms to advice customers aboit possible scams when purchase x number of itunes.

  • serpserpserp on 29/04/2020 - 14:49
    +1

    Wow with people like this out there in the world I can see why people become internet scammers. Easy money.

  • netsurfer on 29/04/2020 - 14:54
    +1

    OP, maybe ask your husband to call his credit card company see if they can help. Though he wasn't scammed by the merchants, those are big merchants (public listing companies).

  • crashloaded on 29/04/2020 - 15:04
    +5

    I have pics of your husband jerking on naughty pics website from web cam. If you don't send me 12 Krispy Kreme I will send to his boss.

    • Kathrifty on 29/04/2020 - 17:19
      +6

      Shame you don't have a video cos otherwise I'd DM you to compare notes

  • Jugganautx on 29/04/2020 - 15:08

    Hahahaha this is better than the "i've got a video of you wanking to nasty porn scam"

    Gold.

  • dragong87 on 29/04/2020 - 16:51
    +2

    I would say look at the positives here.

    In the end your husband caught on and you still have the cards. If you can't get a refund - Worst case you do sell them 20% off and You've only lost $200.
    It could've been a lot worse.

    If it makes you feel better I'm sure I've impulsively spent far over $200 from ozbargain deals and i've never used those things - That's pretty much lost money as well. lol

    • Kathrifty on 29/04/2020 - 17:27

      Cheers for also looking at the positives!

      We are more bummed about being silly enough to be caught out, and the inconvenience and "wasted" time of buying the cards/returning for attempted refunds/talking to various customer services/submitting reports/finding ways to use or sell the cards, than the actual money itself since we know there are avenues for getting some of it back.

      Personally I'm also bummed cos I like shopping and would have happily and easily used other gift cards but I don't know how to effectively use these ones! And yeah, I've probably also "lost" more than $200 through shopping escapades - more so than hubby who dislikes shopping! (he's only heard of Ozbargain through me… As if he'd have his own account)

  • AustriaBargain on 29/04/2020 - 17:56
    -5

    Sometimes I think it must be nice to be like OP and their partner, seeing the whole world with childlike wonder.

  • AustriaBargain on 29/04/2020 - 17:57

    Also I'll buy a few hundred dollars worth of iTunes cards for 15% off.

    • Kathrifty on 29/04/2020 - 18:03
      +1

      I'm actually not quite sure how to take this, considering I don't know if your previous comment was a subtle snub or not. And also that everyone else is suggesting 20%, to which I've agreed, and you've offered 15%.
      *childlike mind getting so confused *

      • AustriaBargain on 29/04/2020 - 18:43

        I didn't see that. I'll take some for 18% off then.

        • Kathrifty on 29/04/2020 - 18:56

          I'll take your word for it - I'll keep you in mind once we figure out what we are doing :) 👍

      • gromit on 29/04/2020 - 18:47
        +1

        anything between 10% and 20% is reasonable, always depends on how fast you want to sell them. If you have friends that use iTunes you could try for 5% with them, you both do better out of it so you aren't hurting them.

        • Kathrifty on 29/04/2020 - 18:58
          +1

          Next step for supportive wife: convince husband to embarrassingly reveal to friends that he's fallen for a scam.

          Thanks for the tip though

          • gromit on 29/04/2020 - 19:02
            +2

            @Kathrifty: absolutely, it was a silly mistake, we are but human and as long as he learns from it. If he is too embarrassed then just say he accidentally bought too many on a website or something and can't return. The discount in value of 10-20% represents the risk the buyer is taking as well as making it worth their while, With friends the risk part disappears as I assume your friends would trust you aren't trying to scam them so just a good deal for them can make for a happy exchange.

  • Vote for Pedro on 29/04/2020 - 18:44
    -1

    Next post: Anyone want to buy ‘unused’ itunes card we bought before realising its a scam

    Just kidding ;-)

    • Kathrifty on 29/04/2020 - 18:55

      I'd be a genius… It's well beyond my capabilities to cook up this thread to convince people I won't scam them with "unused" gift cards.

      (side note for people who are interested: I have receipts from Coles and JB hi Fi to prove that we were silly enough to buy the gift cards yesterday and we didn't steal them :P)

  • mr fox on 29/04/2020 - 18:48
    +2

    They got my sister a month ago. $2,000 on company credit card. Her boss gives iTunes cards as gifts at Christmas time so it didn't seem suspicious. Her company is making her foot the bill, it's had a terrible effect on her.

    • Kathrifty on 29/04/2020 - 19:00

      I can't offer any helpful advice since our situations are quite different - but I feel horrible for her! I'm not sure if it makes any difference hearing that other people fall for boss scams too?

    • ihbh on 29/04/2020 - 19:03

      This is unfortunate; is your sister a PA or works in procurement? Even if the CEO asked me, if I've never done it before, then I'd be very suss!

    • Fysh on 29/04/2020 - 19:06
      +1

      Making her foot the bill for a work mistake is against the law and she should go to fair work. Just like a retail worker getting wage deducted for stolen goods. This is a risk of doing business and having credit cards.

      • Black Brown Blue on 29/04/2020 - 23:22
        +1

        They are 2 seperate solutions. Stolen good is not in your control.
        But handing out card info to a scammer is in your control.

        • Fysh on 30/04/2020 - 00:14
          +1

          Regardless mistakes at work can get you fired but cannot be made punishable by docking pay.

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